Family of Drowning Victim Awarded Almost $3.8 Million

By Andrew Weatherford

Published on September 17, 2009

An Alabama jury has awarded nearly $3.8 million to the family of a man who died from injuries sustained in a hotel swimming pool accident in July 2007. The accident occurred at what used to the King's Inn on West South Boulevard in Montgomery. The hotel is under new management and is now known as a Rodeway Inn.

The nineteen-year old victim, Derrick Marshall, drowned in the deep end of the hotel pool during a family reunion. Although the pool had been shut down by the Montgomery County Health Department, the victim's family claimed that hotel employees gave them permission to use the pool anyway.

Because the pool water was so cloudy, the victim's family was unable to find him for several minutes. The victim was still alive when he was found but was in a vegetative state. He died several months later at Jackson Hospital.

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